Friday, April 08, 2011

Rand Paul doesn't care about his constituents (or the deficit)

"Every regulation doesn't save lives," Paul said in the hearing, later adding that the regulations so far have done a “pretty good job” of reducing black lung. "There is a point or a balancing act between when a regulation becomes burdensome enough that our energy production is stifled. We have to assess the costs of regulation and whether they save lives."

The mortality of chronic lung disease is predicted to decrease at a rate of 1.5% a year until 2030, and yet the cost of treating it is predicted to more than double from $176.8 billion in 2006 to $389.2 billion in 2011 and to reach $832.9 billion in 2021. The reason for this skyrocketing increase is a 31.1% increase in the number of diagnoses predicted by the Milken Institute.
Medicare spent over $8 billion on respiratory disease, excluding pneumonia, in 2006, a figure that is bound to increase tremendously in the next decade.